Iwa Kakeru! Sport Climbing Girls

I had high hopes for this series, but it really just barely met my lowest expectations. As a recent entry in the CGdCT/sports genre, there is plenty of material out there to compare this project to, mostly to it's detriment.

The biggest source of disapointment, after watching the 12 episode run, is realizing how little actual creative thought was put into this show when the premise had such amazing potential. The story runs the typical sports show formula without variation, twists, disruption or contradiction. The character archs are as interesting as a Nebraska Interstate. The art was the best point, ... but the true beauty of sport rock climbing is hard to describe even in anime, the fluidity and awesomeness of the motion really has to be seen to be believed and that means live action at minimum, and probably IMAX would be the optimum format. Voice acting was good, it's just there wasn't much in the script to get excited about. Sound production was fine, but not very inspiring.

In a genre full of good shows but paced by suprisingly good shows like "Girls und Panzer", this show truely fails to live up to its potential. GuP accomplished so much more storytelling in its 12 episodes. Ro-Kyu-Bu! had more interesting characters. Keijo!!!!!!! was more creatively interesting, and Senran Kagura had better fanservice. There are probably even better examples that I haven't found yet. Maybe, if there's a second season, the writing corps will put some real work in, get away from the formula a bit, and make some more interesting choices.

I can see if this pisses off actual climbers but I'm enjoying this show, its entertaining what can I say. Though I do agree that the MC being able to do the stuff that she can straight away with no experience is kind of bullshit as there's no way she'd have enough grip strength, upper body strength and core stability for someone who's played video games all her life. So yeah, that is a bit annoying but I've seen shows with far greater inconsistencies and lackluster explanations of powers that get rated very highly(*coughs* JoJo *coughs*). I think people are being far too harsh on ... this show, its obviously going to piss of climbers who've worked their ass off to be at the level that the MC achieves in literally a day, however, if you go in with an open mind and are able to push that detail aside then you're in for a very enjoyable show. Though I admit that I might be a bit biased because I love shows that have training montages in them as it pumps me up and gets me motivated to either finish a task I've been putting off or workout. Not much of an animation expert but it looks quite fluid, its not great but its definitely not bad. Overall, good show so far.

Story and Character: 7 Honestly the story seems extremely generic so far in terms of sports plots, new girl joins new random club that finds that she has talent in but I think where the story actually shines is 1 the actual main character backstory is honestly kinda likable and hearing her inner thoughts honestly makes the show more entertaining. A lot of the other characters are archetypes but idk if its just the translation I'm watching but I kinda find it funny how they point out things like the main rival girl being a hardass. One thing that I sort of dislike is how ... they do the thing all sports anime do which is have over the top reactions to simple moves and it is super animey (think not Major and more towards the haikyuu side of things).
Art: 9 Easily the best part of this show, for the one the animation is pretty smooth with the actual climbing being well animated with the jumps, etc. (the more motion focused moves in the climbing) being well emphasized with smoother animation. Also I find the MC gamifing the climbing walls cute if not that it gets a little old. BTW All the characters also wear pretty skin tight/skimpy outfits so be ready for a good amount of fanservice, though its not over the top fanservicey which I appreciate, makes it easier to take the show's sport seriously.
Sound: 9 Usually will get a good score as long as the soundtrack is solid and their is nothing to outstandingly annoying about it which is good.
Enjoyment and Overall: 7 Honestly I found the show to be a pretty enjoyable anime about a niche sport which I always love looking at. If you were ever curious about the sport of competitive rock climbing, then I think you will enjoy this anime. Though somewhat generic, it is able gain some unique points through the actual subject of the show being somewhat niche which makes it interesting enough to learn and watch.

A post- apocalyptic adventure for the ages.

This is an incredible pice of art that should be celebrated for generations. A truly deep look into humanity and its determination to survive.

The year is 3126 after the fall of humanity in 2023 due to a devastating strain of SARS-Cov-2 and a subsequent nuclear war over vaccines humanity has only just returned to where it was before it fell. The only artifacts left by the old world were climbing walls. The humans of today worship these walls as gifts from the gods.

The only ones allowed to climb these walls are the ones known as "The Gifted". These are ... extroadinary beings blessed mutations born of the radiation from the nuclear fallout of the great nuclear war of 2023. These mutations have bestowed "The Gifted" with extraodinary climbing abilities. rocking bodies and strangely coloured hair. The mutations are also known to cause phychological abnormalities such as speaking like a cat or being a generic protagonist.

Millions gather to watch "The Gifted" perform the greatest form of praise to the gods: climbing the great walls. If one fails to climb to the top of the wall they are thrown into the crowd who then proceed to devour the disgraced "Gifted".

Truly a great commentary on the brutality of man.
16 Yakisoba pan/2 Wagyu steaks

The Japanese always try to be innovative in some way. For example, in this series called "Iwa Kakeru", they showed off their incredible qualities to be able to create yet another sporting anime, focused however on a lesser known but more extreme sport, called "bouldering" (or rock climbing). reality is a modality that will be shown only once, unlike climbing (ie climbing on an artificial wall and therefore safer and less demanding). All the competitions and events will in fact deal with this last discipline.

Produced by the studio Blade (of which nothing is known) “Iwa kakeru” is an anime with a very simple plot. One ... girl, named Konomi Kasahara, is a first year student of Hanamiya school, looking for something fun to do. In her past he has done nothing but play video games for most of her time (yes like "Sora" of no game no life) and for this she decided to change the air. On a day like any other, she meets another very athletic student, Jun Uehara, who is trying her hand at "climbing" in the open air. Konomi, from the very first moment, seems interested in the subject and, after trying to climb in person, she decides she wants to join the club. Initially taken as fun, Konomi, together with Jun and two other girls from the club, will be able to prove her skills, together with the desire to be able to reach and win the national and world championships in the future.

On a technical level, the series is done well; it doesn't drop much graphics, the characters are done decently, and the movement of the bodies is quite fluid. There is a lack of detail in some scenes but manages to balance it all with good overall quality. Unfortunately, thanks to the various directorial choices, the anime was unable to take advantage of the opportunity to give us a good impression on the setting, which could be asserted, especially in a sport that is very close to nature. Instead the "character design" turns out to be simple and sober, typical of souls not so meticulously studied.

In the anime, there are many characters with fairly similar behaviors, many of which present themselves as fluctuating and slightly obsessive, characteristic of those who want to rival their nemesis or those who want to discourage others. There is not a great characterization although, over the course of the series, we will notice changes in the characters that will make the series, from a certain point of view, better to follow. It therefore tries to be mature and free from too much comedy but, despite this intent, unfortunately there are many annoying and meaningless figures that make it, at times, less convincing. In addition to this we must consider the unbalanced attributes of the protagonist, who proves to be dull and unable to make the viewer seriously reflect on her path of psychological change that takes place in the flow of the episodes. Trust one thing anyway; the anime is represented as an ecci but there are only a few curvy girls. There are really no spicy situations, and if we think we find them we realize that they are simply scenes inherent to the plot and not at all embarrassing.

As I pointed out earlier, the direction makes some risky and rough choices, which unfortunately drastically drop the quality of the series. In many cases we will observe sudden changes from one image to another, without being given the right time between the two. In this case, the anime gives a lot of importance to competitions and in fact almost all the improvement of the skills takes place exclusively on those occasions, leaving everything else marginal, represented with simple and insignificant training. This could be a subjective opinion but it is undeniable that the prevalence of races already from the second episode really makes the sport itself seem not very serious. A problem perhaps given by the plot of the manga or by the choice to focus only on the sports part. In any case, the script is not of a high standard, but the anime manages to mesh a lot between one action and another, and therefore to keep the viewer quite awake. In any case, the anime is not complete anyway and the ending, made too quickly, necessarily takes us back to a second season.

I don't know whether to recommend or not to Iwa Kakeru because she actually lets herself be watched, even if she has a very superficial plot. So I would say that the work can be seen mostly for entertainment purposes only or to superficially get to know the world of "climbing".

But I must say that it has its own moral: despite our proven abilities, it is possible to suddenly fail and psychologically collapse from one moment to the next, especially when you have other thoughts of a different nature than achieving your goal. We can have all the help we want, but it is in solitude that the final decision is made: to give up and dedicate ourselves to something else, or to regain confidence in one's potential.

You can tell they were really reaching with this one. I mean a sports anime about rock climbing is just a bit of a stretch. I guess I'll get over it and boulder on through to my review now.

Okay, okay stop booing. I had to do it. Seriously though, it really feels like they are going out of their way to find more and more niche and bizarre sports and hobbies to cover in this genre. You can tell the age group they're targeting too based on whether it's showing all men or all women in a given sport.

The main girl has typical "I don't ... know what I want to do with my life" syndrome until she sees rock climbing for the first time and goes "I know what I want to do with my life." Standard setup for pretty much any show with high school girls joining a club. She then of course gets way more into it than even anyone who was already on the team and improves at an unrealistic rate because she's the main character. The incredibly flimsy excuse that rock climbing is like a puzzle and she really likes puzzle games is some real loony tunes logic and it's really hard to suspend my disbelief that far. But if you embrace the stupidity of it this can be a really funny show just conceptually. One of those ones that you might try to describe to a friend at party if you had friends and went to parties and they'd think it sounded hilarious only to watch it and wonder what it is you've been smoking and where they can get some.

Overall 7/10 average show

It's pretty common for sports anime to take a few episodes to get into gear. Since the protagonist is usually a novice, albeit one with some special skill that gives them a natural advantage, they usually need to get some training in a sport's fundamentals under their belt before we see much action. While not veering much from that formula, Iwakakeru does get off to a surprisingly brisk start. Novice Konomi is taught the basics and engages in a climbing showdown against a rival in the first episode. That said, it's probably also the show's weakest episode, so I'd recommend not deciding whether to continue ... watching the series until episode 2.

What holds episode 1 back is the way it depicts Jun, Konomi's initial rival. She's an archetype who appears at the start of most sports anime, the super-serious type who berates the newcomer for taking Sport X lightly and brow-beats them with a lecture about the hard work and guts required to succeed. Iwakakeru almost feels like it's included this story beat out of genre obligation because its execution is especially abrassive and off-putting here. The thing is, Jun is only like this in episode 1. Come episode 2 the team is already starting to gel, and more importantly we're introducing to many of their upcoming opponents: a wonderful collection of hilariously quirky weirdos. That relatively dry and dour opening episode is soon forgotten as faces off against the spider-themed climbing girl, the panther, the ballet dancer, and the...zombie?

As someone previously ignorant of the specifics of sport climbing, I was pleasantly surprised to see how much variety there is to it, since the series covers three different disciplines. It also pays a lot of attention to the specifics of climbing techniques, equipment, and the psychological aspect of the sport.

It's just a shame that the series never really excels in any one aspect. Story, characters, direction, art, animation and music are all good, but don't break through to greatness. It ends up being a solid series with a good sense of humour, a dynamic depiction of the sport, and a pretty well-rounded story arc for its 12 episodes.

Just completed watching this series. The story is pretty standard sports anime fare, girl with some talent enter a high school sports club, proceed to train then enter the national competition. No surprises there.

However, the pacing is kinda all over the place and also character development is next to non existent. Only the protagonist and her team mates got some sort of back story, the rest of the characters have little to no back story at all.

While the first few episodes was pretty fun and engaging to watch with a pretty up beat soundtrack, introducing and explaining the various rules, techniques and other ... sports climbing terms . The later half of the series kinda lost the plot. With weak premise for rivalry between the protagonist and the top climber of another team.

This anime have the potential to be great but was put down totally by the rushed production to conclude the series within 12 episodes. The last two episodes was horrible. Totally no impact at all.

What could had been a great anime became a forgettable one which is very unfortunate.

Iwa Kakeru is very good anime that I enjoyed quite a lot.

The story is quite fun. Though at the beginning I thought that it was a bit boring since the characters honestly didn't interest me. I was often confused and annoyed by the action the characters made because I couldn't understand them. But after all the stupid actions they did, the action were explained (by flashbacks and etc.). After that I started loving the characters and when they got to tournaments I was always cheering for them and really excited to see wether they would win or not.

So yeah, this anime gave me a lot ... of joy and excitement. I'd recommend it to everyone who likes sports anime <3.

Story:

Kasahara Konomi ends up in a high school, after apparently not doing so well in middle school due to at least semi-professional levels of puzzle gaming. While wandering around trying to decide what club to join, she stumbles into the sports climbing club, gets interested, joins and almost instantly ends up in a tournament. I don't watch many sports animes, but this seems like a strange sport to focus on, but maybe that is just me. Konomi, of course, ends up doing really well, even up to the point of disheartening some of her opponents (who have been climbing for ... years in some cases) and even some of her own teammates. I don't want to give any spoilers, but I can guess most people can figure out what happens in the end.

Animation:

Animation is average. Not really much to say here, except I don't know who decided it would be a good idea to give that hairstyle to the route setter, wow!

Sound:

Sound also just average, not good, not bad. The opening theme was okay, but I did not really enjoy the ending theme.

Characters:

Also, just average. For the main team, we have the "miracle rookie", then the super serious girl, the super cheerful girl and the tough team captain. Seems pretty standard. Once again I know nothing about this sport in real life, but seems unlikely it would be a competitive spectator support, but a large number of theses girls have amazing nicknames that remind me of action animes or fighting games. They also seems to have extremely strange personalities, including one girl, who to me looks like she comes from xxxHOLIC or another similar psychological horror anime.

Overall:

To me just an average anime. To be honest I finished it, so that I could say I finished it.

I am someone who used to climb, before we went into lockdown I fell while climbing and tore my ACL and miniscus in my right knee and have been pretty depressed since while I wait for surgery. I watched this anime when I heard about it in January and I really enjoyed it.

In terms of characterisation I found the only parts that weren't realistic were the way some of the characters try and sabotage the girl taking it up for the 1st time by either telling her not to take part or purposefully giving bad advice. Even in a competitive situation I have never come ... across people acting like that in climbing.

Secondly the way they show excersises being done, single leg squats are hard for people that are in shape, no way someone who has just started excersising could do them.

The final point I would make is everyone talking about the girls outfits being sexy, I guess as someone who has climbed a fair bit I didn't notice the outfits because that's just how people dress when they go climbing. I honestly didn't consider this anime to be particularly fan service filled as how else would you draw someone climbing?

Either way this anime has inspired me, if my surgery is successful I will start climbing again.

As I said in my Majo no Tabitabi review, there were only two shows I was expecting that began airing in fall, one was that show which turned out to be a disappointment and the other was this one which…was also a disappointment, but for different reasons.

To be honest, the only reason why I wanted to watch it is because I saw the poster and the release date being in early October thus I decided that it was what I wanted to watch after finishing September.

So the first episode begins, plays and finish and there’s no fanservice! Sure some may like certain camera angles ... but they hardly count and are excused for the subject matter thus I don't consider them to be fanservice. Compare this show to Keijo or Harukana Receive and you’ll agree with me. Although that was a letdown for me, I have to admit that it was better this way, is a weird case where I was pissed because the show wasn’t worse than it actually is.

Ok, so leaving my hornyness (does that exist?) aside, that was a positive surprise I received from the show, it wasn’t ecchi crap, it actually tried to be an actual sports show with the same motivational train hard, make friends, have fun with them and win competitions type of story.

The negative surprise I received from the show was the completely unexpected gamer pandering, as the protagonist used to be a shut in neet who used to play games 24/7 during her late childhood/early teens until her parents sent her to another school where she joins the wall climbing club and instantly becomes good at it because she’s a pro at puzzle games, well at least there are parents that actually do something for their neet child.

Sorry but no, this excuse just doesn’t work, first, how does changing schools automatically makes a neet to become a social person and change her lifestyle completely? Second, for a girl that used to do nothing but play videogames all day, she already has some muscle before she even begins climbing; and third, she just started in this sport and can already compete toe to toe with someone who has been training and practicing her whole life, completely naive and unrealistic.

And is not that I don’t like what the show was going for, it went for a inspirational message of leaving videogames behind, working out and starting practicing a sport while still retaining the good things you got from them and learned because of them. Is just that the way it was delivered was, again, just too positive and unrealistic.

This is a problem I have with sports anime in general, they try to inspire the audience with their stories but make their disciplines look like a walk in the park, easy to get in minutes and master in hours when the reality is completely different, they don’t show nowhere near as much training and possible consequences as they should. Sure, the protagonists may lose from time to time and cry enough tears to fill a river but that’s about it. Everyone does things wrong in ther daily lives and cry from time to time, that make the shows relatable but can hardly count as inspirational, they are too idealistic, toned down and manipulative instead of having actual exploration of their disciplines and themes.

I mean, having Konomi succeed in conquering the wall while playing videogames in her mind literally makes it look like a game. These segments become another rather minor issue present in the episode and throughout the whole show, I found them silly but not a big deal, but others may find it too stupid and cringy to the point of dropping the show. It becomes even more of a problem when an even better girl reveals that she’s so good at wall climbing because she plays rhythm games and that ultimately led Konomi to repeat PA-PAPAN-PAPAPAN-PA in her mind in the final episodes, ugh.

Other more important issue has to do with the other characters’ backgrounds, none of them is as bad as Konomi’s but they are way too simple, rushed and presented in inappropriate moments such as the middle of a competition thus stailling the plot, and they all come down to I’ve been doing this my whole life and there’s someone I want to surpass, that’s it.

Another important issue is the very first scene of the show spoiling the ending…or is it? This was my second positive surprise from the show, it made it look like Konomi and Jun would be rivals competing against each other in the final episode but they actually become friends and that flash forward was actually showing the middle of the series, not the end of it, and it wasn’t what it looked like at first.

After that we follow the usual route of training, new characters introduced, character bonding, competitions and stuff and there are both good and bad things present in here.

The good part has to do with Konomi actually failing at climbing at first and even being afraid of it thus making it seem like she would grow organically as a better climber, while at the same time developing Jun a little, the only character who gets that in the series and the best because of it, even if her character arc is the typical cold tsundere who becomes more friendly throughout the episodes, before she fails horribly at something, gets traumatized, leaves, gets over it with the help of someone else and returns stronger with a better design (for me at least):

The bad part has to do with how much Konomi improved to the point of exaggeration, she moved from a rookie with potential to beating opponents who have trained and practiced climbling their whole lives and the whole scanning then conquering the walls in one second gets repetitive and unbelievable very fast, it was like seeing a battle shounen protagonist getting a huge sudden power up after just a few days of training, we’re talking about that level of overpowered.

The show tries to excuse it by saying she always had the potential because she used to do ballet but it’s not believable, she did ballet when she was a child before becoming a neet who plays videogames all day and night so no. At least she doesn’t really win, but in a way that feels cheap, and even then it was nowhere near as bad as what they did with Jun, holy crap was there really a need to treat her so miserably? At least it led to her character development and better design.

Speaking of which, truth be told, all the character designs in the show are…decent, they don’t really stand out from the lot that much, and some of them can become ridiculous when resembling animals, but there’s quite the variety in heights and proportions and all of them have their fare share of muscles for they have been training their whole lives. Oh and they are mostly dressed and are never sexualized, except for maybe a certain shower scene, but even then it’s short and you can’t really see much in it. Again, compare this show with examples such as Harukana Receive and Keijo and you will notice that this is the better show at least in both of these regards.

As for the rest of the visuals, they are also ok, simple artwork, good enough backgrounds, well made but kinda silly special effects, serviceable motions. The sound is also ok, voice acting is nothing much but sound effects and music, while not being anything to write about, are fine.

Eventually the biggest issue the show has is how rushed it feels in its second half, showing the outcomes while barely showing the matches, and having a very cheap finale, I mean come on how did they even win? They lost 2 out of 3 competitions, and then the show just…ends.

So in the end Sport Climbing Girls is a show full of both good and bad surprises leaning a little towards the negative: It doesn’t have fanservice (+) but it panders to gamers (-), it has a good inspirational message (+) but its crappy writing does not support it in the least (-), it seems like it spoiled its own ending (-) but in reality it doesn’t (+), a good chunk of its characters have their backgrounds revealed (+) but they are terribly rushed, simple, and even dumb (-), the main character is overpowered (-) but not really (+) but actually she is indeed overpowered (-), it makes her and her friends fail and not winning all the time (+) but does it in cheap and miserable ways before rushing the ending (-) and it has character development (+) but only for one of them, and it isn’t much (-).

Ultimately, for every step the show takes forward, something else was making it go backwards, essentially failing at what it was trying to do but not to the point of making it atrocious and it was still better than what I expected and is among the better really really bad sport anime with women released in recent years. Now, on to the moe hockey on ice anime that will be released next year.

It's pretty good to bring up the rock climbing as a theme which is also rising in popularity nowadays. This anime also quite able to introduce what rock climbing is. Where the key is like playing puzzles and also training muscles.

This anime contains waifu only, just a normal design. Maybe for those of you who like those fetishies should watch the anime. I quite enjoyed the introduction to the sport itself. But for the story as usual it's like any other sports anime. The characters are also familiar in sports anime, some are sneaky, opulent, arrogant, blablabla. Comedy? I don't feel like it or ... I'm surprised to see MAL there is a comedy genre.

The standard animation just doesn't get the hype right when it comes to rock climbing. Only gave the angle of the fetishes. This anime is pretty good for you getting to know what rock climbing is and how the competition do. But the story's instinct is really generic. Maybe what can be highlighted is the fetishes angle of the muscles and muscles.